Tuesday, March 31, 2015

Expeditious Retreat Press is looking for authors for three 1 on 1 Adventures for the Pathfinder rpg.Project Length: 10k-14k words, with target of 12k words.Pay Rate: $0.01 cent/edited word. Pay on acceptance via PayPal or USD check.Additional details: I'm looking for three new adventures in
our line of 1 on 1 Adventures. We've put out 16, I've one in manuscript
form right now, and I'm looking for #'s 18, 19, and 20. 1 on 1
Adventures are for one player and one GM. Any expressing serious
interest will be provided examples of published adventures for
guidelines in terms of format and style.

1 on 1 Adventures require a different creative hand than standard
adventures. For example, any magic that paralyzes is effectively a death
sentence when there is only one player (barring the intent to capture,
of course.) Prospective authors should take this difference into
consideration.

I prefer site-based adventures over plot-based adventures (but any
type of good adventure is desired), and am particularly looking for
adventures for the more martial classes.

Respond by: I would prefer responses occur prior to May 1,
2015 to josephbrowning@gmail.com with title "Call for 1 on 1 Adventure Manuscripts!" If you're interested, please contact me.

Monday, March 30, 2015

It's been almost 7 years since I put out any Magical Medieval Society stuff, but that's changed as of this morning. The PDF, A Magical Medieval Society: On Place Names has entered the world and I'm glad to see it out there. If you want some help with naming the places on your maps, you will probably want to check this one out. It's a little bit more than $5.

Bring the rich history of place names into your game! A Magical Medieval Society: On Place Names provides tips and tricks for GM interested in creating good place names for their campaign. Included is a 500+ word list providing detailed information regarding the historical naming of places in the UK. This powerful resource can be used as a guide for newly created words in a campaign language, or as drop-and-roll resource providing limitless combinations right out of the gate.

Make the names on your maps make sense! Pick up A Magical Medieval Society: On Place Names!

A broad and meandering, yet incisive, view on the methods of transmitting alchemical truth, Springsilver’s work is a highly contentious one. Destroying the master/apprentice relationship, she strives to bring alchemy into the scholastic tradition, openly discussing alchemical truths that many believe should be concealed. Executed for her efforts, few copies exist of this, her final work.

Salt, Sulfur, Mercury is a very old text, perhaps several millennia old. It is believed to be one of the first alchemical texts and will almost surely be found in any scholarly alchemical library. Unfortunately, the information contained within is uniformly useless, either from centuries of mistranslations or from excisions in the text regarding important steps in alchemical processes. It is kept today more as a historical piece than as a source of knowledge.

In this large, detailed work, Panopt delves deeply into the spiritual nature of the alchemical search: the search to transmute the human soul from its base metal into gold. A highly metaphorical work, yet one also squarely rooted in exoteric application, Esoteric Alchemy is a masterful discourse on the subject. Rarely found even in alchemical libraries, it draws a strong price from interested parties.

Monday, March 16, 2015

As some of you know, I've recently started a Patreon campaign to help keep me working on the Tome of Tomes series. I've just handed over the first seven on the 15th to my supporters, and would like to mention that I'm only a single Patreon away (only $1 per set of tomes) from hitting my 3rd milestone of releasing 8 tomes twice monthly. So thanks to my kind Patreons, I'd like to share the first tome of the seven released to the Patreons on the 15th just passed.

A foundational work regarding dwarven medicinal mushroom fermentation and mushroom tinctures, Korpora’s Spagyrics is commonly found in the libraries of dwarven healers, but rarely found elsewhere. Spagyrics quickly and clearly covers all the calcinations used with the more common underground mushrooms, but the work is brief and leaves a lot to be desired for the experienced dwarven alchemist, herbalist, or healer.

Wednesday, March 11, 2015

Been a while since I last updated on the new Magical Society PDF designed to help GMs name places, but I'm now up to 500 entries. I'm in the "W" section and soon will be finished with the dictionary. I've then to jump to an older text on the subject where I'm sure I'll add a few more, but I believe that I'm mostly done now. I may hit 550 entries, but I think that would probably be the end of it.

I do admit that I chuckle whenever I think that I will have actually read an entire dictionary when I'm done with this. I have a wild and crazy life!

Wednesday, March 4, 2015

I woke up this morning planning to start a 3 day-long GM's day sale on our PDFs over at OBS, but as I looked through my social media at everyone reflecting about Gary, I just couldn't bring myself to do any business promotion today. This means I'll start our 50% off sale tomorrow (5th-7th) and it'll run for 3 days.

Today I'm just going to be another gamer, glad to have had the chances I did to speak with Mr. Gygax. Tomorrow I'll put on my business-owner hat.

And to preemptively make sure I'm not misunderstood - I'm completely fine with others using the day to celebrate GMing commercially, as GM's day was, after all, created long before Gary passed. I'll probably do the same next year as I've done many years before.

But this year, I don't really know why, I just didn't feel like doing it.

Monday, March 2, 2015

I'm very happy to say that the Tome of Tomes Patreon Campaign I started yesterday is successful and we've even passed our first milestone goal! I'm pleased about the support and because of it, I get to spend time today coming up with new books for fantasy libraries. Excellent!

I've decided that since I'm going to be releasing 6 tomes every two weeks (perhaps 7 if I get a few more patrons), I'm going to group them into small themes reflecting the interests of a particular subject. For example, the first group of 6 is going to be books you could find in a Alchemist's library. Titles so far include: Korpora’s Spagyrics, Esoteric Alchemy, Salt Sulfur Mercury, Scholastic Alchemy, Outer Alchemy, Rasâyana. The last two are the most rare, being from far-away eastern lands...

Sunday, March 1, 2015

So I've started a Patreon campaign for my Tome of Tomes series! I've decided to do this because, as you all know, I support myself doing this rpg-writing gig and that means I try to focus my efforts (and time) on things that I think will turn out to be the most profitable. Sometimes I'm wrong about that choice, but most of the time I can guess pretty well. I've been doing this a while after all.

That means that sometimes the things I enjoy most I can't spend much time on. One of those things is the Tome of Tome series. I *really* love writing up those little books, but the time involved can be surprisingly non-cost-effective. Writing them helps me get in touch with the wonder I had as a 12 year-old, diving into dungeons and finding secret, esoteric libraries.

So here's where you guys could come in. If I could only get 5 people to support my efforts, I'd feel ok about spending the time needed to create them. I've decided that I'm going to give it a good 6 month shot regardless how many Patreons support my efforts, but after that I'll bow to reality and accept that I need to put my efforts elsewhere. Also, all the tomes will posted here on the blog of course.